GigPark is on TechCrunch :)
Just a short post to let you all know that Erick Schonfeld of TechCrunch has just written a great article about our baby, GigPark. A fantastic way to finish a fun week at work!
The killer quote: "I don’t know about you, but I’d much rather get recommendations from people I know or who I can ask about than from anonymous strangers."
Laptops that cost less than your phone
What do we really need in a laptop?
Well, if you're like me most of your *stuff* lives on the web now (Flickr, Gmail, Google Cal, PBwiki, Basecamp...), not on your hard drive. So, maybe we don't need as much as we once did from our laptops. Or maybe we just need different things: a speedy web connection, ultra-portability and good battery life?
The funny thing about ultra-portable laptops is that we drop them and leave them places - well I do anyway! So, I think ultra-potable should also mean ultra-cheap.
Because of this I'm WAY more interested in the $299 ASUS Eee PC and $399 CloudBook than the $1,800 MacBook Air.
The Eee only has a 7inch screen and 4GB of memory but it will check Gmail, make Skype calls and update Basecamp projects just as well as any other laptop. It also look pretty easy to mod in some interesting ways and is on sale in Toronto for $299.
The CloudBook has a much bigger 30GB hard drive but isn't available just yet. Apparently we'll be able to pick one up from Walmart in a few weeks.
A good friend just bought an Eee so I'll keep you posted on what he thinks of it. I might not be far behind him.
UPDATE: I had a play on my friend's Eee this morning. Brilliant! The interface is nice and simple, the keyboard and trackpad work great and the size is mind blowing. It's called a laptop but this thing only sits on one knee (it's not big enough to actually sit on your lap!). When the version with the 9 inch screen is released later this year, I'm in.
My adventure in book publishing ;)
Rosalynn's Grandmother turns 80 this year and as a present Rosalynn has put together a great little family cookbook. Aunties, uncles and cousins all sent in their favourite recipes and on Nana's birthday everyone will be getting a rather professional looking cookbook in the mail.
We published it on Lulu.com.
Lulu's simple little tools and step-by-step instructions made it incredibly quick and easy. Format a Word document, upload a front and back cover and your done. And the price was fantastic.
For me this was a really powerful example of what the web has made available for everyday folk. We just published a simple book! 10 years ago that would have taken us a few months and cost thousands of dollars.
Skype’s goodwill gesture not likely to generate much goodwill
Last week Skype, the massively popular VOIP company, stopped working for a couple of days.
This morning I got my first email from Skype about the outage:
You may or may not know but last week Skype wasn't available for a couple of days. There were a number of reasons for this and I am delighted to say that the problem is now well and truly sorted and everything is back to normal...As a goodwill gesture to all you faithful Skype Pro, Skype Unlimited, SkypeIn or Skype Voicemail customers, we're adding an additional seven days to your current subscription, free of charge.
7 days of free service!?
A product that millions of people pay for and use everyday stops working for 2 days. Do they really think 7 days of free service will generate any goodwill? Keep in mind some of Skype's customers use a Skype-in number as their main phone line.
My cynical conclusion (based on no facts at all!) is that eBay, Skype's owners, might have applied the pressure. I can imagine a tense boardroom scene with a Skype exec wanting to do something for their customers and someone from eBay pointing to the revenue targets and frowning.
Photo: iloveacomputer
“Ted Rogers… Hello… Are you out there?”
The iPhone ads are annoying enough when I'm reading the New York Times (iPhone coming to Canada anytime soon Ted?) but this week it was even worse... T-Mobile had a full page promotion for their new HotSpot @ Home product.
Here's the gist: Buy a HotSpot phone ($49) and a wireless router and, while you're at home, T-Mobile will route all of your calls through the internet without you doing a thing. This means unlimited nationwide calling while you're at home (or any of the T-Mobile HotSpot locations) for only $10 per month. Now that sounds pretty darn good to me.
So Ted, when do you think we can expect to see this in Canada?... Ted?
How to build a successful Facebook application – insights from FacebookCamp Toronto
Last night the GigPark crew, a handful of my friends and what seemed like most of the Toronto tech community descended on the MaRS building for FacebookCamp Toronto.
FacebookCamp was part of the Facebook Developer Garage series and focused on strategies and tips for developing a successful application on the Facebook platform.
The highlight of the night for me was a presentation by Meagan Marks, a platform manager from Facebook. She offered some great insight into user behaviour on the site, clearly laid out all of the ways you can integrate with Facebook and offered some strategies for making sure your application benefits from "the Facebook effect".
I was going to write up my notes but Joey deVilla has already done a much better job than I would have over on the Global Nerdy blog (thanks Joey!).
The key points I took away from the event were very simple:
1. Successful applications offer self promotion for users (on my profile as well as other areas of Facebook) and social comparisons based on actions (am I smarter, hotter, better travelled... than my friends?)
2. Successful applications often integrate very deeply into Facebook (apparently some developers have found up to 14 different ways to integrate: messages, profile actions, the wall, share buttons...)
Happy Facebook developing everyone!
Sprawl
For most of us, this would be complete interface overkill. But after seeing Ethan Kaplan, head of technology for Warner Bros. Records, at the Mesh conference this year, I think his brain moves fast enough to make use of it.
Pluses and minuses of living in Canada
Minus: Putting up with second rate mobile phone companies.
This week us Canadians are sitting here watching America go crazy for the iPhone (launching at 6pm this Friday). You'd think now would be the perfect time for Rogers to announce a release schedule for Canada. But no, silence. To rub salt in the wounds we all got a nice look at the AT&T/iPhone rate plans announced yesterday. They are about half the price of a regular Blackberry plan in this country and they include unlimited data transfer!!
Comparison...
AT&T iPhone plan: $59.99 (USD)
- 450 daytime minutes
- 5000 nights and weekends
- Unlimited mobile to mobile
- Unlimited data
- 200 text messages
Rogers Blackberry plan: $112.95 ($90 + $6.95 system access + $6 text plan)
- 350 daytime minutes
- Unlimited nights and weekends
- 25 MB data
- 125 text messages
Today's USD exchange rate: 0.94
Tom had a great post a couple of months ago detailing our fate as Canadian mobile data consumers. It's not pretty.
What a startup can get out of the Mesh conference
I'm sitting here this afternoon reflecting on the Mesh conference, which was finishing up this time last week. I had an unbelievably good time and got a lot out of the 2 days (and nights). In particular, our startup benefited a lot from Mesh.
If you are running a startup yourself, here is a short guide to what you can get out of Mesh next year:
1. Knowledge
This is an obvious one. Pick your sessions carefully and you'll walk away with some valuable startup tips. In particular, look out for any workshops relating to the basics of setting up a business - funding, legal issues etc.
2. Contacts
Another obvious one. Mesh might be the biggest opportunity of the year for Canadian tech startups to find your next adviser, lawyer, partner, employee, landlord, client etc. Make sure you share cards/details and remember to be nice and email your new friends in the days following the event to say hi.
3. Energy and excitement
I find Mesh like a shot of adrenalin. I have so many inspiring conversations that I leave the conference FULL of passion for my business and for my life. This kind of excitement can fuel you for months.
4. Feedback
Mesh is full of smart and experienced tech minds. This is a great environment to quietly, and respectfully, pull someone aside and ask if they would like to see your prototype product. A quick demo is almost sure to get some constructive feedback that will help you improve whatever you are working on.
5. Media and promotion
Hundreds of blog posts are written before, during and following Mesh. Many people are genuinely interested in writing about new startups. If you seek these people out you might be lucky enough to grace the pages of some very well read blogs. There is also 15 Minutes of Fame - a great initiative to showcase Canadian startups.
6. Friends
Definitely the most important thing I got out of Mesh. I met some wonderful, smart, generous people this year, as I did last year. When you are getting a project off the ground having good friends is invaluable. Be friendly, approach people and make sure you buy a few rounds at the bar!
See you next year!
Photo: Rob Hyndman (Mathew Ingram talks with Michael Arrington at Mesh).
“Eee slaughters the OLPC with ease” – ZDNet
Let me start by saying that I think One Laptop Per Child is a great initiative. Sure, it has its critics, but this is an incredibly ambitious project aimed at making the world a better place - and I would never stand in the way of that.
Selfishly, from the very outset of this project I've always liked the idea of owning one of these little green machines. They're (going to be) cheap, small, fast and rugged - all things that make them an appealing second laptop for the times I don't want to lug my PowerBook around. Also, the idea of a fairly low powered (dumb) little machine to access all of the web applications (smart) I use to run my life is perfectly in tune with my idea of technology.
So, while we wait for Nicholas Negroponte and his team to get these little PC's into production, ASUS and Intel have come out with an alternative, and it looks pretty cool.
Here is the word from George Ou at ZDNet:
The ASUS Eee computer will cost a mere $199 for the 7" LCD model whereas the so-called $100 OLPC costs $175. Given the fact that Eee can run Linux or Windows XP and it can boot off NAND flash memory in a mere 15 seconds, the Eee slaughters the OLPC with ease.
And some more info from CNET Asia:
Like the Fujitsu LifeBook FMV-U, the ASUS Eee PS runs off an Intel Mobile processor and is fully compatible with Windows and Linux. Named after the ideals of easy to learn, work, play; excellent Internet experience and excellent mobile computing experience, the Eee PC sacrifices raw power to keep its form factor at a handy 225 x 165 x 35mm, while weighing only 890g. The unit is also fully connected, with access to both wired and wireless networks though its modem, Ethernet port, 802.11b/g and Bluetooth radios.
Nice touches include the use of a solid-state harddisk that is resistant to shock and drops. Sitting on the hinge just under the 7-inch display is an integrated Webcam for video conferencing.
About Pema Hegan
A Kiwi living in Canada.
I love music, obsess over architecture, ride my bike most days and miss the ocean.
I'm a partner and managing director at Rethink Toronto.
Before that I founded and then sold GigPark, a social web startup. And before that I was the founding editor-in-chief of the Canadian media company, Dose.
Find me here
pema.hegan (at) gmail (dot) com
- @malbonster Don't laugh too loud. I remember Boys being some of the best Thai food in the city. http://twitter.com/pema
- @ryanfeeley No. But wow - that looks interesting! Next time ;). http://twitter.com/pema
- @ebonical Next time we just need to time our trips so we can enjoy some if it together!! http://twitter.com/pema
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